I'm reading The Twenty-Seventh City with bittersweet feelings as it is his only novel I had left to consume. I savor and regret every page.

I love many things about him but one I've never contemplated or articulated is his skill (gimmick, some would say, I know) of conveying huge plot points in an understated, in fact barely stated, zero-entry fashion. Your eyes just go along through their introduction, and a few words or lines afterward your brain goes "Hey whoa wait WHAT?" and you go back and have to re-read and re-read a few times to catch up to the enormity and significance of what is happening. There was one moment like that in FREEDOM which, despite that not being my favorite of his, I will NEVER, ever forget. Which reminds me ... this novel too demonstrates an almost incomprehensibly vast and deep understanding of the female psyche. It's a little scary.